Sometimes conflicting beneficiary designations for 401(k) plan assets can be tough to sort out when a plan participant dies. It took a verdict from the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the 9 th ...

Key Takeaways Beneficiary designations on retirement accounts override your will when it's time to determine who inherits your funds.Many people forget to update beneficiary forms, which leads to ...

A beneficiary designation is a document — usually a simple form — that tells a financial institution or insurance company who ...

An employer’s retirement plan documents did not incorporate beneficiary designation forms in its language or appendices, so the forms did not govern the award of benefits, a court ruled. A federal ...

An often-neglected area in the world of benefit plan administration is the beneficiary designation form. Many participants complete their beneficiary designations incorrectly because they don’t read ...

In Becker v. Mays-Williams, 13-35069-cv, 2015 WL 348872 (9th Cir. Jan 28, 2015), the Ninth Circuit – in a matter of first impression – concluded that beneficiary designation forms were not “documents ...

When you think of estate planning, most people think about getting their wills and trusts in order. But for many investors, their IRA or 401(k) beneficiary designation form will control the ...

A federal district court has ruled for a second time on litigation arising from a dispute over verbal and written beneficiary designations. A thorny Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) ...

Benefit administrators, 401(k) vendors, recordkeepers and benefits professionals regularly recommend that participants in qualified retirement plans periodically review and update their beneficiary ...

A May 2017 decision of the Federal Court for the Middle District of Florida should provide an impetus for employers with employer-sponsored retirement plans to reevaluate their beneficiary designation ...

Most people name a spouse, child, or close relative as the beneficiary on a retirement account or life insurance policy and assume the job is done. What they don’t realize is that the choice directly ...

Beneficiary forms trump last wills and testaments in court, so those with assets to pass on to heirs should regularly update them. Errors on the part of plan administrators can creep in when, for ...